Boy Refuses to Pledge Allegiance because of LGBT Inequality

A ten-year-old Arkansas boy named Will Phillips has taken a stand for gay rights by refusing to take the Pledge of Allegiance at his local elementary school.  He figures that since "liberty and justice for all" doesn't apply to LGBT folks, he's not going to recite something that he knows is a lie.  From the Arkansas Times:  Will's family has a number of gay friends.  In recent years, Laura Phillips said, they've been trying to be a straight ally to the gay community, going to the pride parades and standing up for the rights of their gay and lesbian neighbors.  They've been especially dismayed by the effort to take away the rights of homosexuals – the right to marry, and the right to adopt.  Given that, Will immediately saw a problem with the pledge of allegiance.  “I've always tried to analyze things because I want to be lawyer,“ Will said. “I really don't feel that there's currently liberty and justice for all.“  (What an amazing kid.  Fearless.  His family should be bursting with pride.)  After asking his parents whether it was against the law not to stand for the pledge, Will decided to do something...  When the other kids in his class stood up to recite the pledge of allegiance, he remained sitting down.  The class had a substitute teacher that week, a retired educator from the district, who knew Will's mother and grandmother.  Though the substitute tried to make him stand up, he respectfully refused.  He did it again the next day, and the next day.  Each day, the substitute got a little more cross with him.  On Thursday, it finally came to a head...  “She got a lot more angry and raised her voice and brought my mom and my grandma up,” Will said. “I was fuming and was too furious to really pay attention to what she was saying.  After a few minutes, I said, 'With all due respect, ma'am, you can go jump off a bridge.'”  Will was sent to the office, where he was given an assignment to look up information about the flag and what it represents. 

A lot of Will's friends have been supportive of his decision.  But according to Times article, those who disagree with him "are much more crazy, and out of control and vocal."  (And he's been taunted with anti-gay slurs.)  No huge surprise there, Arkansas being one of only six states that oulaws adoptions by same-sex couples.  Conservative to the core.  But the boy has a high-profile defender in Arkansas News columnist John Brummett, who writes:  I am proud of the free-thinking young man. I am pleased that the principal did not discipline him for free thinking, but for the ill-advised suggestion that the substitute teacher take a long walk off a short bridge...  Actually, I’ve been pondering an all-American compromise.  The boy could stand up and say his own freely expressed pledge.  Rather than pledge allegiance to the flag and to the republic for which it stands, he might say, “I offer my voluntary loving support for my free country and the republic for which this flag stands.”  Rather than say “one nation under God, indivisible,” he could say, “one nation, not subject to anyone’s forced religion, and where the right-wing Texas governor was free even to intimate his state’s secession.”  Rather than say “with liberty and justice for all,” he could say, “with liberty and justice for many people, but, sadly as yet, not gays or lesbians.”  That ought to satisfy everybody.

But of course it wouldn't satisfy everybody.  It wouldn't satisfy members of the Religious Right who embrace every hateful word they hear from the pulpit.  It wouldn't satisfy the bullies who torment Will for speaking his mind.  It wouldn't satisfy the substitute teacher who loathes non-conformity and badgered him to comply with her wishes.

Brummett's suggestion satisfies me, though.  And I bet it would satisfy this intelligent young man.   

Comments

[Amanda]

This kid is a hero in my eyes.

[Aggie, Fair Haven, Vermont]

Yep, kids know what's fair, and what isn't. We seem to lose some of that sense as adults.

[Luis]

He's definitely a hero in my eyes as well.

[michael]

You can thank Jehovah's witnesses that he is not being expelled. They are the ones who took refusal to pledge alegience to the Supreme Court. What many of them and their children went through to have this 'right' granted for all Americans is truely courageous.

[Ben]

MediaCurves.com conducted a study among 328 viewers of a new clip discussing a student who refuses to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance in support of gay marriage. The majority of viewers (66%) reported that the student should not be forced to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. While the majority of respondents supported the student after watching the video, prior to viewing the video, the majority of viewers (65%) indicated that students “should be” forced to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. More in depth results can be seen at:
http://www.mediacurves.com/Politics/J7639-PledgeofAllegiance/Index.cfm
Thanks,
Ben